TAMPA, Fla. — It's the greeting from I-275 to Tampa: Ashley Drive. Now, it's getting a facelift.
Tampa Mayor Jane Castor announced plans Tuesday aimed at adding more pedestrian and biker-friendly measures while reconnecting the neighboring areas.
"What makes this important is the Interstate clearly cuts through our North neighborhoods, downtown neighborhoods, and our downtown and also cuts off access through Ashley Street for safe access to our waterfront," she said. "We want to turn that street grid back to its original structure and then provide affordable and workforce housing in that location."
With help from Congresswoman Kathy Castor, the city secured more than $5 million in federal funding through the Reconnecting Communities Pilot Grant Program. It'll help propel the nearly $11 million project.
"Here in Tampa, 100 years ago, the grid system connected neighborhoods. Tampa Heights was connected to downtown. Seminole Heights was connected across before the interstate was there. Ybor City was cut in half by the interstate construction. What we're doing now in partnership with local communities is knitting our neighborhoods back together," said Congresswoman Castor.
The Uniting Neighbors and Infrastructure for Transportation Equity (UNITE) Grant will help the city lower the Ashley Drive Interchange Ramp to street level. That means getting rid of the viaduct that is currently lifting the interstate exit ramp.
"The mistake of the Ashley ramp is now more apparent because of the expansion of Tampa's Riverwalk, of Armature Works, of the growing residential communities in Tampa Heights and downtown," the Congresswoman said.
The plan is to reconnect North Downtown to the grid system.
Gloria Jean Royster lives and works downtown. She's spent 10 years pushing for that very change.
"One day, I did what someone just referred to as the Ashley Street Dash. I purposely crossed over Tampa Street, which has no traffic lights. And I went under the Ashley Drive Viaduct. Yes, I know it's dangerous, but I was trying to prove a point," she said. "And I use that to access the riverwalk to determine and to show that it would take less time that seniors need access and that it would it takes less time to go under the Ashley Drive Ramp than it does me walking all the way to Tyler Street and going over to the Riverwalk. We didn't understand why we didn't have access."
This federal grant project will:
- Provide new bicycle and pedestrian routes
- Create new street connections at Royal Street and Harrison Street, reducing barriers to walk/bike connectivity and access in north downtown
- Support development opportunities for mixed and affordable housing, along with ground-floor retail
- Establish a project Community Advisory Committee
- Create new opportunities for green infrastructure and parks accessing the riverfront and community-based place-making along Ashley Drive
- Allow for potential future connection to Laurel Street
Royster spends her days giving Madam Fortune Taylor Historic Walking Tours. She said she wants to see the history behind the Ashley name included in these changes.
"[William and Nancy] were master and servant, but they lived together as husband and wife before, during, and after the Civil War. And Nancy is the only black person buried in the white section of Oaklawn cemetery on Harrison Street down the street in our neighborhood," she explained.
